Koolbardi Student Group
We started 2022 with our new Koolbardi (Magpie in Noongar) group brainstorming creative ideas for Vasse PS NAIDOC week celebrations. On Mondays during this term, the student group will get together in year levels. There’s a huge task ahead, but plenty of time to gather their brilliant ideas and plan to bring them to life to spread the message throughout the school for this annual event that is also very close to our hearts. NAIDOC celebrations will take place at the end of Term 2. Students are eager to get their creative juices flowing and showcase our wonderful indigenous culture to the whole school community!
Bunuru Bonar
Also did you know it is the season of Bunuru Bonar (The Second Summer – Season of Adolescence). Bunuru is the hottest time of the year with sparse rainfall, long days and hot easterly winds along with the continuing cool sea breezes that grace us most afternoons.
Traditionally this was, and still is, the time of the year where the Wardandi Noongar would be living along the coast, rivers and estuaries gathering fish, crabs, mussels as well as marron and turtles from the wetlands. Because of this, freshwater foods and seafood were a major part of their diet during the Bunuru Bonar (Season).
It was also the time when the wattle seeds, banksia blossoms and various roots were collected.
This is the time of the year the flowers of the flowering Gums are in full bloom, including Jarrah, Marri and Ghost Gums, along with the striking coneflower from the Djiridji or the female Zamia palm (Macrozamia riedlei).
In late summer families would traditionally get together in large numbers around freshwater sources along the coast, to hold their annual corroboree (meeting/gathering).
Gemma Bynder (AIEO)
Aboriginal and Islander Education Officer
